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I seem to have slipped into making pretty uninspired salads for work lunches recently, so this time I wanted something a little more coherent, with complementary flavours and textures.
Enter broccoli and basil!
I go through phases with broccoli, sometimes I can take it or leave it and other times I really crave it. It’s so nice in salads and paired with basil makes a lovely dish for the end of summer.
I’ve also added butterbeans for a creamy texture, olives and sun dried tomatoes to complement the basil, and cucumber for crunch. Lovely!

Steam the broccoli until just cooked. I did mine for 3 minutes in the microwave, with a little water.
Pick and separate about 1/3 of the basil leaves and set aside.
Blitz the rest with the oil from the tomato jar, vinegar, water, and salt and pepper.
Mix together the drained broccoli, butterbeans, olives and dressing. Leave to cool completely and then fold through the cucumber and basil leaves.

Doesn’t green soup always feel ever so nutritious?
And this one is, being full of spinach and kale 🙂
There are also apples for sweetness and acidity, sun dried tomatoes to add a little richness, and potato for a lovely texture.
All the flavours come together to make a very satisfying soup!
It’s so easy to make, everything just goes in the pot together. It could be cooked in the oven as most of our soups are but this time we used the hob. Add around 10 -15 minutes to the cooking time if you’re using the oven.
It’s pictured below with a sandwich made from our beetroot bread, which makes for a very pleasing colour palette!

Put the spinach and kale into a large pot on a medium heat and pour over the hot water. This will start the spinach wilting and enable you to fit the rest of the ingredients in!
Add the apples, sun dried tomato, potato, oregano and thyme. Bring to a simmer, partially cover and cook with the heat on low for around 25 minutes until the potato is soft.
Blend the soup until smooth (we used an immersion blender), and season to taste with salt and pepper.

The first time we made this recipe we wrote it up with the title ‘the best of biscuits’, and they really are the nicest we’ve made so far! And we’ve made a lot of biscuits…
The oat flour adds a gorgeous toasty flavour, and adding whole oats too gives them a great texture. They’re a cookie type of biscuit, so crisp round the edges and chewy in the middle, and they’re perfect for dunking in tea!
You could omit the peanuts if you like, but they’re so good with the chocolate that it would be a shame to leave them out 🙂

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees c and line two trays with baking paper.
Sift together the oat flour, cornflour and baking powder and mix in the oats and salt.
Cream together the margarine and sugar. Add the flour and oat mixture and beat together until everything is well combined.
Lastly add the chocolate chips and peanuts and mix well to ensure they are evenly distributed. It should be a sticky dough.
Divide the mixture into 12 balls and lay 6 on each tray, with plenty of space around as they spread a lot while baking. Pat them down a little. You can do them in two batches if you only have one tray, the dough is fine to sit a while.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes until the edges are browned.
Cool completely before eating to let them set.

We actually didn’t expect this beetroot bread to turn out such an amazing colour!
The crust stays a beautiful bright pink and the inside, due to the yellow corn meal, turns a lovely soft orange colour.
And as well as looking spectacular, it tastes good too! The beetroot powder adds a slight sweetness and earthy flavour which is really delicious.
This is a loaf that gets better as it keeps, the texture is nicest after a couple of days. But it’s hard to keep it that long, and thankfully it’s yummy freshly baked too!

Whisk together the tepid water, yeast and sugar and leave for around 10 minutes until frothy.
Mix together the tapioca flour, millet flour, rice flour, corn meal, beetroot powder, xanthan gum and salt. Use a balloon whisk, it’s easier to get it all properly combined that way.
Tip the yeast mixture and oil into the flour and beat together until well combined. It should be a thick batter.
Tip into a non stick 750 ml loaf tin and smooth the top. Cover with oiled cling film and prove for around half an hour until the batter has risen just over the top of the tin. It’s important to oil the cling film or the batter will stick to it!

Beetroot bread batter ready to be baked

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees c.
When the batter has proved bake for 40 – 45 minutes until the loaf has risen, formed a nice crust, and feels hollow when the bottom is tapped.

Butternut squash is such a versatile vegetable that I tend not to think of stuffing it. It always seems like a bit of a cop out, stuffed squash is rather a veggie cliche!
But this time I couldn’t help myself, I had dried wild mushrooms, olives and tahini, and when I saw pomegranate seeds in the supermarket, the seeds of an idea for a great recipe were sown…
It really is delicious, sweet roasted squash with a stuffing full of earthy savoury flavours with the mushrooms, tahini and olives.
And the pomegranate seeds and pea shoots finish it off very nicely!
It slices ever so well too, Alex and I ate it for a couple of days of work lunches, a quarter squash per portion.
And of course, it’s very pretty. That always helps with the anticipation of a good lunch!

Preheat the oven to 190 degrees c.
Halve the squash and scoop out the seeds and fibrous bit. Rub each squash half with 1 tsp oil and place cut side up in a roasting tray. Cook for 30 minutes, flip over and then cook for a further 15 minutes. The thicker part of the squash should be tender enough to allow a fork to pierce it, but not be completely soft.
While the squash is roasting make the filling.
Cook the rice in about 200 ml water until just soft. There should be a very little liquid left. For this recipe I only lightly rinse the rice, as it’s nice if it’s quite starchy and sticky when cooked, it helps the stuffing hold together.
If you’re leaving the rice a while before stuffing the squash, pop it in the fridge to cool down properly.
When you’re ready mix the dried and fresh mushrooms, tahini and olives with the rice and season well.
Scoop a little of the butternut squash out of the ‘neck’ end and mix that into the rice as well.
Now you should have a good space all along the squash for the stuffing.
Put half of the rice mixture in each squash half and pack it in well. It will make a lovely big mound.
Bake the stuffed squash for 45 minutes if the rice mixture was cold when you put it in, 5 – 10 minutes less if it was warm.
Garnish with the pea shoots and pomegranate to serve.

I’m not sure why potato rosti is so satisfying, but it really really is!
I guess, like with roast potatoes or chips, it’s the combination of potato with a crisp outer layer and a soft inside, which is always going to be such a comforting combination.
This recipe makes a great lunch, combining the rosti with a lovely fresh apple and dill coleslaw, and a savoury, creamy walnut pate.
It’s really quick to prepare if you have a food processor with a grating attachment, but if not you can always slice the cabbage, celery and apple for the coleslaw. The potatoes and carrot do need grating though! The ground ginger in the coleslaw may seem an unusual ingredient, but do try it, it’s just a tiny bit so you don’t taste it as such but it complements the flavours of the vegetables beautifully.
We ate the rosti between the two of us, and had coleslaw and pate left for another meal, but you could serve it as a starter for 4 with the rosti cut into quarters.

Grate the potatoes first, and then tip them into a clean tea towel and wring out over the sink.
Heat the oil in a (preferably low-sided) frying pan on a medium heat. Add the potatoes, with salt and pepper, to the pan and squash out into a large round, about 5 mm thick. Cook for around 5 minutes until golden brown. Flip, and cook the other side for a further 5 minutes. While the rosti is cooking make the coleslaw. Simply combine the vegetables and apple with the oil, vinegar, dill and seasoning and mix well.
For the walnut pate, whizz all the ingredients together in a food processor or with an immersion blender until combined but still with a little texture.
Serve the rosti cut into halves or quarters, with the coleslaw and pate on the side.

This weekend Alex and I have been stripping wallpaper and sanding walls, it’s hard work, and so dusty!
So for lunch today we needed something easy and nutritious, with minimal time spent in the kitchen.
We’d picked up some spiralised vegetables cheap at the supermarket the other day, so we combined them with gluten free spaghetti, toasted cashew nuts, tarragon, and a cheaty sauce made from vegan cream cheese (we used violife brand).
It was gorgeous, comforting while still giving us a good amount of vegetables, and some protein from the cashew nuts. The tarragon really makes it though!
It’s a combination of flavours we’ll be making again, possibly with the vegetables diced rather than spiralised, the textures will work just as well.

In a dry saucepan on a medium heat cook the cashews, stirring often until starting to brown, around 3 minutes. Tip into a dish to cool.
Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil (use the cashew pan for ease), and cook the spaghetti according to the packet instructions. Steam the courgette and butternut squash (I use the microwave), 2 – 3 minutes each if spiralised, a little more if diced.
Drain the pasta and return it to the pan on a low heat. Add the vegan cream cheese, tarragon and soy milk. Stir until the cream cheese has melted into a sauce.
Mix in the nutritional yeast and salt and pepper to taste.
Toss through the courgette, butternut and cashews.

I didn’t really feel like I should be calling this a moussaka, with it being vegan, but the flavours definitely have a nod to the Greek classic!
I guess with there being a meat free base, and a dairy and egg free topping, it should maybe be called moussaka, veganbungalow style… The first time I made moussaka, many moons ago, it was with a white sauce based topping, but as I researched more recipes over the years I changed to the type more like a savoury custard. So that’s what I’ve recreated here. Soy yoghurt and silken tofu blended with tapioca and flavourings sets up nicely and add a lovely richness.
Also, although aubergine (eggplant) are more well known in a moussaka, Alex would grumble furiously if I used them, so here I’ve gone for courgettes (zucchini). I actually prefer them!
The only oil in the recipe is drizzled on top to brown the courgettes, making it super healthy. To be honest though, that was mainly laziness, I didn’t want to wash up a frying pan…

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees c.
Put all of the ingredients for the lentil layer, apart from the salt and pepper, in a large saucepan and bring to the boil. Turn down the heat and simmer for around 25 minutes, uncovered, until the red lentils have disappeared into the sauce and the green lentils are tender.
Season to taste.
While the lentils are cooking, steam the potatoes and courgettes. The potatoes need to be tender, and the courgette slices starting to go bendy. Cook them separately, I used the microwave.
Whizz together the ingredients for the savoury custard in a food processor until smooth.
Slice the potatoes into 5 mm slices and place them in a layer in the bottom of an ovenproof casserole dish. I use a 20 cm round one (I also used this to cook the lentils, and then transferred them to a bowl for the layering).
Add the lentils next, and then a good thick layer of courgettes, use about 2/3 of them.
Next the savoury custard, and then arrange the last 1/3 of the courgettes prettily on top.
Drizzle with the oil. Bake for 20 minutes, and then flash under the grill for a few minutes to brown the top if you like.

We’re finding ourselves having less and less time for cooking new things recently, we’re eating the usual delicious salads for work lunches and that sort of thing, but nothing really new enough to blog about on the whole!
But this, although we can hardly believe it, is our 300th post for veganbungalow!
So it feels like the right time to make something special.
In our experiments with the flour mix we use for our pittas, we’ve discovered (oh joy of joys!), that it makes a great gluten free pasta!
It has a wonderful texture, and can be used for tagliatelle, tortellini, ravioli and all those sorts of things.
For this recipe we’ve kept it simple, just a basic dough with a little beetroot powder added for a fun colour, and a super quick and delicious pea and basil pesto.
It’s definitely a dish worthy of our veganbungalow milestone!

To make the pasta, mix together the dry ingredients with a balloon whisk and slowly add the water, mixing with your hand until it forms a dough. It should be fairly soft and pliable.
Pop the dough in a plastic bag, and rest it in the fridge for at least 20 minutes. It will be hard to roll if you don’t.
While the dough is resting, make the pesto.
Simply whizz all of the ingredients together in a mini processor, or use a pestle and mortar. It should not be completely smooth you want a bit of texture.
Dust your board with a little rice flour and roll the dough out to around 1 mm thick. Cut into 10 mm strips.
Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil and carefully drop the pasta in. Bring back to the boil and cook the pasta for 2 minutes and then drain. The pasta will swell up a little as it cooks
Serve the papardelle with the pesto plopped prettily on top.

Oh these are good! Potato and citrus isn’t a combination that I tend to think of instinctively, but I guess that may be my northern European palate…
The British way with potatoes tends more towards pairing them with mint or parsley, that sort of thing. Or frying them or mashing them of course!
But slowly baked in a lemony, herby broth the potatoes soften but hold their shape and go a little sticky around the edges. Yum!
They’re great warm as part of a main meal, or cold in a salad too.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees c.
Put the potatoes in a roasting dish that holds them comfortably without being crowded.
Whisk together the lemon juice, oil, hot water, rice flour, celery seed and dried herbs and seasoning.
Pour the mixture over the potatoes. Cover with foil. Bake for 45 minutes stirring half way through.
Remove the foil and bake uncovered for 30 minutes.
The potatoes should be beautifully tender and a little sticky. Scatter the parsley on top just before serving.